"METEORA announce their third studio album "...of Shades and Colours," featuring 13 tracks in total, including three orchestral intro songs, this album is our most ambitious record so far. Showcasing all the colours of the band we invite our listeners to a journey through Power, Gothic, and Death Metal all wrapped in heavy orchestration." Just a side note...this is a genre that has now become saturated in the world of Metal, so bands need to bring their A game with them if they want to be remembered. Let's see how METEORA measures up.

Symphonic Metal has been around since before the turn of the century, allegedly started by bands like NIGHTWISH, SRATORVARIUS, and EPICA. Or, was it DIMMU BORGIR, with their signature blend of Symphonic Black Metal? In any case, we've had more than 20 years to enjoy this type of sound. It is a close cousin to Power Metal in a few ways as well. Many bands use samples for the orchestral elements of their music, to bring a meaty background of neo-classical sounds into Metal, because who can afford to hire an entire orchestra for their album? Let's dig into "...of Shades and Colours."

 Thirteen tracks await the listener. Let's get to some of the highlights. "Downfall" and "Wings of Rebellions" are the first songs. The familiar gallop of Power Metal is of course present; I mentioned above the close relationship in the two genres. Three types of vocals are used...clean female, clean male, and harsh male. "Slave of Creation" is a heavy offering rich with symphonic elements. So far, the songs are good, but nothing special. As I mentioned above, bands need to bring their A game with them, because the genre of Symphonic Metal has become overgrown, with thousands of bands trying to keep, or get, a foothold in the genre. "Awaking" and "Pests - Tragedy of Delusion Pt. II" is a slower grind of light orchestral elements and that infamous "beauty and the beast" one-two punch of clean female vocals and harsh male vocals.

"Waking Nightmare" is an eight-minute opus. The sound is fairly tender at first with some exploration that they have time for. Everything is placed very well within the music, but it just fails to be catchy on a few levels. "Trail to Eden" and "Immortal" are another just average and mediocre song. They band plays with confidence, but these melodies are just not getting through. The ten-minute title track closes the album. It starts off pretty well, but then gets bogged down in lamenting tones for much of the track. The lead guitar work and harmonized vocals are quite nice, but the track just fails to be memorable.

The positives? The band are quite good at mixing everything together into a cohesive whole, with is a feat in this genre. They are also excellent musicians. The negatives? I hate to be this guy, but through thirteen tracks, they failed to create even one with a memorable punch to it. My remedy would be to dial back some orchestral elements and focus more on the development of melody. Creating some dynamism would also help, so that the songs have memorable accents to them.